Are Voters More Engaged in 2016?
Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump has routinely claimed that GOP turnout in the primaries was surging in 2016, and the anecdotal evidence seemed to agree, but a new report shows just how much of a surge the party has seen so far.
According to Breitbart News, 2016 GOP primary and caucus turnout is has been more than 8 million votes greater—more than 60 percent higher—than in 2012. As a result, the outlet quotes several Republican operatives as saying, the eventual nominee will benefit in November:
In total, so far, nationwide the GOP has seen an increase of 8,719,041 votes in 2016’s primaries, caucuses and conventions over 2012’s primaries, caucuses and conventions. In 2012, 14,452,500 people voted in each of the states and territories that have held contests so far in 2016. In 2016, 23,171,541 people have voted in the GOP contests so far. That is a 60.33 percent increase in GOP contest turnout in just four years.
Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus reacted to the news in an exclusive comment to Breitbart News saying that voters are flocking to the GOP after a bad past eight years with Democratic President Barack Obama because they know Democrat Hillary Clinton as president would be “disastrous.”
“After eight years of Barack Obama, voters throughout the country know that four years of Hillary Clinton would be disastrous,” Priebus said in an email. “Almost to a state, we are seeing record turnout because voters know it’s the Republican Party that has the ideas and solutions that will move America in the right direction.”
